My buddy Rael was going to be in town on Friday, and the Tribeca Film Festival was premiering a new movie about PiL and Johnny Rotten. Neither of us were big PiL fans, but this seemed like a fun date. I bought tickets.
Fast forward a few weeks, and Rael is sick. He can’t come into town. So I call my musically adventurous friend Julie. I know she is not a PiL fan, not a Sex Pistols fan, but I’ll have fun with her in any case. Plus, it turns out, there will be a discussion with Lydon/Rotten after the screening. More show biz!
We both order fish and chips at the venerable Tribeca institution, Walkers, and the fish is great, the cole slaw is fine, and the chips are very tasty. That’s a win.
Here’s the deal on the movie, in a few short bites:
If you love PiL you will chew this movie up with delight. It not only fetishises each version of the band, it exalts the Rotten process. Your taste is reified.
If you come from a more historical perspective, the movie does a pretty fine tick tock of the whys wheres and wayfores of the band over a long career.
If you enjoy watching John Lydon sing PiL songs, there’s lots here for you.
If you enjoy watching John Lydon talk about his life, there’s a good amount of that for you.
If you were an observer of PiL, and not a fan of the music, I think you might find a lot of fun in the music. More than you might expect. Less in Lydon’s memorable vocals than Wobble’s bass, Levene’s skronky guitar, and the similarly discordant and yet powerful music all the iterations of this band made.
So, there’s lots to like about the movie, but when you think about it as a movie, it starts to pale. This is a movie that seems to get Johnny Rotten talking emotionally and revealingly about his life. It’s a movie that chronicles many internecine wars among the various configurations of PiL. And it is, most tellingly, a movie that buys John Lydon’s version of the story.
Lydon’s version is a good story, but all the other voices in the film have other stories. And they’re allowed to tell them up to a point. That’s the point where Lydon/Rotten decides to drown them out.
What I’m describing is not an indictment. Rotten/Lydon, in the post-screening chat, talks about how he aspires to be a valued songwriter. He is saying he doesn’t think he’s there yet. He’s right about that, and wonderfully honest to admit it.
But the history of PiL the film describes is the arc of moving from talented and disorganized non-professionals to, over 20 years, the hiring of professional musicians who can actually play. And then marvelling at how everything got better.
And in many ways it did, but what seems to me most revealing is how all the aesthetic challenges disappeared once the band was competent. And this idea of competent musicians versus energetic amateurs is an invigorating discussion for everyone, but the movie glides over the issues.
It’s easy to see why, but without a discussion about talent, expression, experience, professionalism, talent and creativity, plus other stuff, I’m not sure how much what they produced matters.
I love PiL, I went to the screening tonight, because of this appearance I saw one morning in 1980 on American Bandstand:
Nuff said.
Since I’ll be too lazy/busy to write about it otherwise, I’ll mention here that I’m finishing up “Lonely Boy” – Pistols’ guitarist Steve Jones’ recent autobiography. I find some books full of material that I know I should be reading, but I labor through them. Others could be way more perfect in a literary sense, but are so entertaining I can’t put them down and dread finishing. The Jones book is of the latter.
“Fun to read” is a somewhat rare, very underrated literary quality. I always cite Bill James as the best example. It’s what’s lacking (among other qualities) in 99 percent of the self-made internet authors of today (of course I’m talking baseball writer wonks more than anything else).
Anyway, this film thing sounds a lot like Lydon’s second autobiography “Anger Is An Energy,” which focused a lot on PiL. I’ll add that, if you want a definitive knowledge of the short, explosive career of the Sex Pistols, read Lydon’s two books and the one by Jones and you’ll know pretty thoroughly all there is to know, from two very different perspectives.
I loved the second PiL, “Metal Box.” The debut had its moments. “Flowers Of Romance” is horrible. After that, what I know is very spotty. I did go back and buy “Album” after finishing the second Lydon bio. It includes “Rise” which is a decent song, but the album as a whole didn’t interest me.
Discussed this with Peter a bit at TOUT, but I’ve given some thought recently to how much Lydon’s persistent war against rock ‘n’ roll since the Pistols seemed kind of cool at first, but has essentially cheated rockers like me out of God knows how much good rock music later on. I can’t imagine there wasn’t at least another one good rock record to be made using Lydon’s wonderful, unique rock voice. As it is, “Bollocks” is all we have, although Lydon’s rock one-off makes that album sort of more perfect.
In the second bio, Lydon laughs at the Sex Pistols fans who were disappointed, thinking the first Public Image album would simply be the second Sex Pistols album. I played along to be cool at the time, but I can honestly say these days I was and am firmly in that “silly” camp.
It’s likely a new Lydon rock project would’ve been on the down slide by the fourth or fifth album like most bands, but geez, I’d trade everything Public Image ever did for that second Pistols album.